Six Pack Shortcuts’ Mike Chang Revealed to be Chinese Soft Power Exercise

WASHINGTON, D.C. — After months of investigations, the CIA has concluded that the workout videos fronted by Internet fitness guru Mike Chang are in fact a soft power initiative conducted by China’s Propaganda Department. In a report released on Monday, CIA investigators claim to have found a video depicting the musclebound personal trainer attending a Communist Youth League rally in Yan’an, Shaanxi.

In the controversial video, Chang is welcomed on stage by the provincial party secretary and is congratulated for his achievements in “furthering the dissemination of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics through subliminal techniques against China’s enemies.”

The report goes on to say that despite having been portrayed as an American-born fatty-fatty-fat-fat turned health and fitness specialist, Chang, age unknown, is in fact a PLA supersoldier, whose remarkable muscle development is the result of “superior Chinese dieting, superior Chinese medicine and all-natural anabolic steroids.”

Since the publication of the startling report—which also reveals that Chang speaks Chinese with a strong Henan accent and can strip a Kalashnikov in 28 seconds—subscribers to Six Pack Shortcuts have launched protests around the world, claiming that there is no connection between Mike Chang and the Chinese Communist Party.

“These are lies spawned in the rotting womb of American imperialism,” proclaimed ripped German subscriber Hans Müller in fluent Mandarin at a rally in Berlin.

“Smash the decadent West,” he added.

Chang and his indoctrinated followers.

Mike Chang’s workout videos mark a major departure in China’s traditional efforts to exercise soft power. While international observers had expected Beijing to shift toward making cultural products that aren’t utterly horseshit, the deployment of Mike Chang to tap the repressed homosexuality at the heart of American culture has proven devastatingly effective.

“We thought maybe China would try to make a half-decent kung fu movie, or produce some jailbait girl band that sings in broken English,” said Barry Leavenworth, a professor of cultural studies at Columbia. “Nobody thought they’d aim for America’s Achilles’ heel—the secret longing to be dominated by an Asian muscleman that stirs in the heart of every Midwestern male trapped in an unfulfilled life.”

Leavenworth argues that by tapping into a need previously fulfilled by varsity Greco-Roman wrestling and Men’s Health, “Chang could potentially reprogram every unmarried, unemployed Western man with low self esteem to love China and the Communist Party while believing that they’re just building muscle and stripping fat.”

By breaking down and analyzing Chang’s popular workout videos, CIA operatives discovered that Chang’s grunts, rather than simple exertions of effort, are actually mantras designed to take control of a subject’s mind. The experts claim that:

While blending a detoxifying, anti-fat smoothie, Chang mouths commands to boycott all non-China made goods.

A tattoo on Chang’s right bicep, initially thought to be of an eagle, is on closer inspection a depiction of Chairman Mao Zedong punching out Uncle Sam.

Most alarmingly, Chang’s usual sign-off, “Execute Order 66,” believed by fans to be a cheerful, if cryptic, catchphrase, seems to correspond to impromptu gatherings of shirtless, muscular men chanting Mandarin in metropolitan areas.

If genuine, the CIA’s findings could be proof of the most egregious attempt by China to subvert the minds of Westerners since single frames depicting the Rape of Nanking were found spliced into Kung Fu Panda 2.